Rewards and Fairies
A CHARM
Take of English earth as much
As either hand may rightly clutch.
In the taking of it breathe
Prayer for all who lie beneath —
Not the great nor well bespoke,
But the mere uncounted folk
Of whose life and death is none
Report or lamentation.
Lay that earth upon thy heart,
And thy sickness shall depart!
It shall sweeten and make whole
Fevered breath and festered soul;
It shall mightily restrain
Over-busy hand and brain;
It shall ease thy mortal strife
’Gainst the immortal woe of life,
Till thyself restored shall prove
By what grace the Heavens do move.
Take of English flowers these —
Spring’s full-facéd primroses,
Summer’s wild wide-hearted rose,
Autumn’s wall-flower of the close,
And, thy darkness to illume,
Winter’s bee-thronged ivy-bloom.
Seek and serve them where they bide
From Candlemas to Christmas-tide.
For these simples used aright
Shall restore a failing sight.
These shall cleanse and purify
Webbed and inward-turning eye;
These shall show thee treasure hid,
Thy familiar fields amid,
At thy threshold, on thy hearth,
Or about thy daily path;
And reveal (which is thy need)
Every man a King indeed!
INTRODUCTION
Once upon a time, Dan and Una, brother and sister, living in the English country, had the good fortune to meet with Puck, alias Robin Goodfellow, alias Nick o’ Lincoln, alias Lob-lie-by-the-Fire, the last survivor in England of those whom mortals call Fairies. Their proper name, of course, is ‘The People of the Hills.’ This Puck, by means of the magic of Oak, Ash, and Thorn, gave the children power —
To see what they should see and hear what they should hear,
Though it should have happened three thousand year.
The result was that from time to time, and in different places on the farm and in the fields and the country about, they saw and talked to some rather interesting people. One of these, for instance, was a Knight of the Norman Conquest, another a young Centurion of a Roman Legion stationed in England, another a builder and decorator of King Henry VII.’s time; and so on and so forth; as I have tried to explain in a book called Puck of Pook’s Hill.
A year or so later, the children met Puck once more, and though they were then older and wiser, and wore boots regularly instead of going bare-footed when they got the chance, Puck was as kind to them as ever, and introduced them to more people of the old days.
He was careful, of course, to take away their memory of their walks and conversations afterwards, but otherwise he did not interfere; and Dan and Una would find the strangest sort of persons in their gardens or woods.
In the stories that follow I am trying to tell something about those people.
Cold Iron
When Dan and Una had arranged to go out before breakfast, they did not remember it was Midsummer Morning. They only wanted to see the otter which, old Hobden said, had been fishing their brook for weeks; and early morning was the time to surprise him. As they tiptoed out of the house into the wonderful stillness, the church clock struck five. Dan took a few steps across the dew-blobbed lawn, and looked at his black footprints.
‘I think we ought to be kind to our poor boots,’ he said. ‘They’ll get horrid wet.’
It was their first Summer in boots, and they hated them, so they took them off, and slung them round their necks, and paddled joyfully over the dripping turf where the shadows lay the wrong way, like evening in the East.
The sun was well up and warm, but by the brook the last of the night mist still fumed off the water. They picked up the chain of otter’s footprints on the mud, and followed it from the bank, between the weeds and the drenched mowing, while the birds shouted with surprise. Then the track left the brook and became a smear, as though a log had been dragged along.
They traced it into Three Cows meadow, over the mill-sluice to the Forge, round Hobden’s garden, and then up the slope till it ran out on the short turf and fern of Pook’s Hill, and they heard the cock-pheasants crowing in the woods behind them.
‘No use!’ said Dan, questing like a puzzled hound. ‘The dew’s drying off, and old Hobden says otters’ll travel for miles.’
‘I’m sure we’ve travelled miles.’ Una fanned herself with her hat. ‘How still it is! It’s going to be a regular roaster.’ She looked down the valley, where no chimney yet smoked.
‘Hobden’s up!’ Dan pointed to the open door of the Forge cottage. ‘What d’you suppose he has for breakfast?’
‘One of them. He says they eat good all times of the year.’ Una jerked her head at some stately pheasants going down to the brook for a drink.
A few steps farther on a fox broke almost under their bare feet, yapped, and trotted off.
‘Ah, Mus’ Reynolds – Mus’ Reynolds’ – Dan was quoting from old Hobden, – ‘if I knowed all you knowed, I’d know something.’1
‘I say,’ Una lowered her voice, ‘you know that funny feeling of things having happened before. I felt it when you said “Mus’ Reynolds.”’
‘So did I,’ Dan began. ‘What is it?’
They faced each other stammering with excitement.
‘Wait a shake! I’ll remember in a minute. Wasn’t it something about a fox – last year. Oh, I nearly had it then!’ Dan cried.
‘Be quiet!’ said Una, prancing excitedly.‘There was something happened before we met the fox last year. Hills! Broken Hills – the play at the theatre – see what you see – ’
‘I remember now,’ Dan shouted. ‘It’s as plain as the nose on your face – Pook’s Hill – Puck’s Hill – Puck!’
‘I remember, too,’ said Una. ‘And it’s Midsummer Day again!’
The young fern on a knoll rustled, and Puck walked out, chewing a green-topped rush.
‘Good Midsummer Morning to you. Here’s a happy meeting,’ said he. They shook hands all round, and asked questions.
‘You’ve wintered well,’ he said after a while, and looked them up and down. ‘Nothing much wrong with you, seemingly.’
‘They’ve put us into boots,’ said Una. ‘Look at my feet – they’re all pale white, and my toes are squdged together awfully.’
‘Yes – boots make a difference,’ Puck wriggled his brown, square, hairy foot, and cropped a dandelion flower between the big toe and the next.
‘I could do that – last year,’ Dan said dismally, as he tried and failed. ‘And boots simply ruin one’s climbing.’
‘There must be some advantage to them, I suppose,’ said Puck, ‘or folk wouldn’t wear them. Shall we come this way?’
They sauntered along side by side till they reached the gate